What the fuck is wrong with you people?
Healthcare
A clever PSA reminds you to have a mammogram.
Mar 9th
It’s a cute ad with a serious message:
Honk for mammogram awareness.
SEB Mailbag: “You wonder why healthcare is so expensive? It’s not the Doctors or Hospitals.”
Feb 25th
I’m probably going to get myself in trouble with this one. There are people of a conservative persuasion in my circle of friends and extended family and most of them have learned not to send me email forwards of any kind because I have a bad habit of hitting Reply To All when I don’t agree with the email. This was one of those emails and it had been sent to almost 40 people, including me, so my reply is going out to a lot of people I don’t actually know. That usually results in whoever the friend or family member that forwarded it to me getting rather angry about the fact that I sent my reply on to the other recipients.
The email itself is the usual Republican attempt at bashing the current administration, but it was unusual in that it was mercifully short. It consisted of a video clip of some form of testimony from a hospital administrator about the high costs of providing medical treatment to illegal aliens. Here’s the video clip found on YouTube followed by the terse message that accompanied it:
How did we get to this and why are we continuing to let it go on? Time for new leadership.
Carroll
My reply was not as mercifully short so I’ll include it after the jump.
Keith Olbermann slams Obama and Congress over the Senate HCR bill.
Dec 18th
There’s not much here I disagree with:
There are some out there that argue that the bill still accomplishes a lot, but I’m very worried about the provision that mandates everyone has to buy health insurance or face a fine unless they can prove they can’t afford it. Combined with the lack of controls over prices this sounds like a wet-dream come true for the health insurance companies.
Kill the provision or kill the bill.
Too much faith will make you crazy: Man dies waiting for God to heal him.
Dec 11th
Another in our ongoing series of people who had perhaps a tad too much faith takes us to South Carolina and 33 year-old Mr. Tillman. It seems Tillman tore his ACL back in March and when he went to the doctor’s office to get patched up they told him he’d have to pay $300 upfront before the repair could be done. Mr. Tillman couldn’t afford the appointment so he drove back home and settled his 550-pound frame, naked save for a blanket, into a recliner where he took up a Bible and stayed… for the past eight months believing all the while that God would heal him.
His wife tended to his needs as best as she could, but in the end God decided he had via better things to do than to heal Mr. Tillman:
“He read his Bible daily, he spent his full focus on God,” said Webb. “And he was literally waiting and praying for a Job miracle. If anybody knows the Bible and knows Job, he really and fully believed that God was going to heal him just like he did Job, because he said he couldn’t think of a better testimony to go out and to tell people.”
For eight months they had no visitors. Webb rarely left his side, and she tried to keep him clean.
“I couldn’t get him rolled over to use a bedpan,” said Webb.
Other than eating and reading the Bible, she says Tillmon posted sermons online and texted messages of faith through his cell phone.
“He wanted so much to get up and you know, he wanted to tell everybody what Jesus done,” said Webb.
I can only imagine the filth that must have gathered in that chair as he sat there, for eight months, relieving himself. I can’t imagine anyone else putting up with it for that long, but put up with it she did until the bitter end:
Webb says Tillmon consistently told her not to call for help. She says Wednesday morning he was in so much pain that she finally called an ambulance.
Greenwood County authorities say they found Tillmon covered with sores, and that he appeared to weigh about 800 pounds. They say he was stuck to his chair, and they had to saw the recliner apart. They cut a large hole around the front door to get him out.
He died at the hospital.
He had managed to pack on another 300 pounds in eight months? That’s an impressive feat in itself.
The wife, as you’d expect, is beside herself with grief for not getting help for her husband sooner.
Actually, that’s not true at all. She’s fine with it:
Webb says she has no regrets about leaving him in that recliner.
“If I feel anything right now, it’s envy for him because I wish he had taken me with him,” said Webb.
Officials, amazingly enough, aren’t charging her with a crime. I guess the figured they couldn’t come up with a punishment worse than what she’d spent the last eight months living with.
I get emails all the time from various True Believers™ with uplifting stories about how they prayed and God cured them of cancer, or gallstones, or whatever and I often write back and ask if they sought any medical treatment for their condition. Each time the answer is yes. I wonder how well they would have fared if they had the amount of faith in God that Mr. Tillman had. I wonder if their God would’ve been as happy to help had they not sought medical treatment. It’s somewhat amazing how often God’s willingness to cure you is tied to whether or not you’re getting medical attention.
The other aspect of this story that isn’t as obvious is how it shows the need for a public health care system in this country. Perhaps if Mr. Tillman didn’t need to worry about whether or not he could afford to go to the doctor he’d still be alive to spread the message of God’s love. At the very least, his wife wouldn’t have gone through eight months of hell on earth.
Found over at Pharyngula.
Is public healthcare in Britain really that bad?
Aug 12th
Obama’s plans for healthcare reform in the US are far from uncontroversial and many of those on the right side of the political spectrum have been coming up with various facts and figures to undermine his moves to widen access. One of the (perhaps unintended) targets of this has been Britain’s National Health Service (NHS), a ‘socialised’ health care system, and many claims have been made about its supposed failings. But are these claims really true? British newspaper The Guardian investigated the claims and came up with the facts:
The claim: Ted Kennedy, 77, would not be treated for his brain tumour if he was in Britain because he is too old – Charles Grassley, Republican senator from Iowa.
The response: Untrue, says the Department of Health. “There is no ban on anyone of any age receiving any treatment, ” said a spokesman. “Whether to prescribe drugs or recommend surgery is rightly a clinical decision taken on a case by case basis.”
The claim: In England, anyone over 59 years of age cannot receive heart repairs, stents or bypass because it is not covered as being too expensive and not needed – an anonymously authored, but widely circulated, email, largely sent to older voters
The response: Totally untrue. Growing numbers of patients over 65 with heart conditions are having surgery, including valve repairs and heart bypass surgery, says Professor Peter Weissberg, the British Heart Foundation’s (BHF) medical director. For example, the average age at which people have a bypass operation has risen from 58 in 1991 to 66 in 2008.
There are several more which reveal the true facts. It’s true that survival rates for breast and prostate cancers are lower in Britain than in the US, but whether that is due to the standard of treatment or care, or down to other factors (such as diet, exercise or genetic variations) isn’t explored. In any case, not one of the major British political parties promotes the abolition of the NHS, and barely any of the minor ones would abolish it either. While most Brits, politicians or otherwise, would happily spend half an hour telling you about how the NHS could be improved, you would find it hard to find anyone who would want to get rid of it altogether.
Rep. Virginia Foxx talks out of her ass, again. (#Blogathon)
Jul 25th
North Carolina representative Virgina Fox (Republican, if you couldn’t guess) has a habit of saying some pretty ignorant things. She continues that trend just recently by declaring that there are no Americans without health care:
Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) disputes President Obama’s claim that 47 million Americans lack healthcare. “There are no Americans who don’t have healthcare. Everybody in this country has access to healthcare,” she says. “We do have about 7.5 million Americans who want to purchase health insurance who can not afford it,” she says, urging Congress to adopt a new plan for healthcare reform that wouldn’t “destroy what is good about healthcare in this country” and “give the government control of our lives.”
OK, technically she’s correct. No American is without health care because you can always just walk into an emergency room and they’re obligated to treat you, but you have to be pretty sick to go to the emergency room. It would be more accurate to say that there are 45 million people without health insurance, but you’re really just splitting hairs. If you don’t have insurance then you’re not going to have health care until you’re very, very sick and by then it may be too late. At the least it’ll be even more expensive than it would have had you had the insurance and went at the first sign of trouble.
You may remember an entry I wrote back in 2005 about my cousin dieing from pneumonia because she didn’t have health insurance and didn’t go to the doctor like she needed to. At the time I was just a month from being laid off from Ford and thus losing the decent health insurance I had for me and my family. It’s an issue that I’m very concerned about as a result of those two events. It’s long past time that we had a public option available to us, preferably something along the lines of France or Canada. We’re the richest country on the planet and when there’s a war or two the be fought it seems there’s no end to the money that can be found to fight them. The moment someone suggest we spend some money to take care of our own, however, all hell breaks loose.
Those are some fucked up priorities if you ask me.
Ten years and $2.5 billion shows “alternative” medicines don’t cure jack shit.
Jun 11th
In news that will likely fail to dissuade folks who buy into the whole alternative medicine nonsense, the report from the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine says that just about every alternative treatment they tried failed to produce results:
Echinacea for colds. Ginkgo biloba for memory. Glucosamine and chondroitin for arthritis. Black cohosh for menopausal hot flashes. Saw palmetto for prostate problems. Shark cartilage for cancer. All proved no better than dummy pills in big studies funded by the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine. The lone exception: ginger capsules may help chemotherapy nausea.
As for therapies, acupuncture has been shown to help certain conditions, and yoga, massage, meditation and other relaxation methods may relieve symptoms like pain, anxiety and fatigue.
All it took was ten years and $2.5 billion in taxpayer money despite the fact that many other independent studies have already shown this to be the case. So will the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine, which I still have a hard time believing is a government run organization, shut down and admit that there’s nothing to this nonsense? Of course not. They plan to spend even more money studying even more ridiculous claims:
However, the government also is funding studies of purported energy fields, distance healing and other approaches that have little if any biological plausibility or scientific evidence.
Taxpayers are bankrolling studies of whether pressing various spots on your head can help with weight loss, whether brain waves emitted from a special “master” can help break cocaine addiction, and whether wearing magnets can help the painful wrist problem, carpal tunnel syndrome.
The acupressure weight-loss technique won a $2 million grant even though a small trial of it on 60 people found no statistically significant benefit — only an encouraging trend that could have occurred by chance. The researcher says the pilot study was just to see if the technique was feasible.
What the fuck? Why are we wasting money on crap that has no basis in science?
“You expect scientific thinking” at a federal science agency, said R. Barker Bausell, author of “Snake Oil Science” and a research methods expert at the University of Maryland, one of the agency’s top-funded research sites. “It’s become politically correct to investigate nonsense.”
Oh, that’s why.
Look, I’m all for testing of “alternative” medicines and therapies that could plausibly have some scientific basis. Echinacea for colds is a good example. Asprin comes from willow bark so it was entirely possible there might have been something in echinacea that could affect colds. We tested it. It doesn’t do squat. Put it aside and move on. But brain waves being emitted by a “master” to cure cocaine addiction? Fuck me, but that’s stupid.
“There’s not all the money in the world and you have to choose” what most deserves tax support, said Barrie Cassileth, integrative medicine chief at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York.
“Many of the studies that have been funded I would not have funded because they seem irrational and foolish — studies on distant healing by prayer and energy healing, studies that are based on precepts and ideas that are contrary to what is known in terms of human physiology and disease,” she said.
Exactly! Let’s apply a little of the scientific knowledge we already have on how the universe works and prioritize based on how plausible a particular treatment might be. The further away from established theories a proposed treatment is the lower on the priority list it should be when it comes time to test.
So why are we wasting time and money on the implausible shit? Because the board that runs this agency is well populated with people who buy into the alternative medicine bullshit. Not only are they in control, but even when a study shows something doesn’t work they refused to state that fact plainly preferring to hide behind the “more research is needed” cop out:
However, critics say that unlike private companies that face bottom-line pressure to abandon a drug that flops, the federal center is reluctant to admit a supplement may lack merit — despite a strategic plan pledging not to equivocate in the face of negative findings.
Echinacea is an example. After a large study by a top virologist found it didn’t help colds, its fans said the wrong one of the plant’s nine species had been tested. Federal officials agreed that more research was needed, even though they had approved the type used in the study.
“There’s been a deliberate policy of never saying something doesn’t work. It’s as though you can only speak in one direction,” and say a different version or dose might give different results, said Dr. Stephen Barrett, a retired physician who runs Quackwatch, a web site on medical scams.
Critics also say the federal center’s research agenda is shaped by an advisory board loaded with alternative medicine practitioners. They account for at least nine of the board’s 18 members, as required by its government charter. Many studies they approve for funding are done by alternative therapy providers; grants have gone to board members, too.
“It’s the fox guarding the chicken coop,” said Dr. Joseph Jacobs, who headed the Office of Alternative Medicine, a smaller federal agency that preceded the center’s creation. “This is not science, it’s ideology on the part of the advocates.”
Basically it’s the practitioners of woo-woo nonsense making more than a few bucks on the taxpayer’s dime while they busy themselves with shifting the goalposts so as to never have to say it doesn’t work. The rest of the article goes on to list off defenses by the foxes guarding the chickens, but it’s all bullshit. Not only have there been many independent studies that show this stuff doesn’t work, but even with 10 years these guys have yet to come up with anything that is clearly beneficial. There are several studies that show taking herbal supplements can interfere with legitimate drugs such as those used by cancer patients. Additionally the actual contents of a particular supplement can vary wildly between different manufacturers and can contain all sorts of potentially harmful contaminates.
This agency needs to be revamped. Get rid of the True Believers™ and staff it with qualified people capable of running proper studies and then prioritize based on the plausibility of a particular treatment. Do the study, release the results, and move on to the next one. Line ‘em up and knock ‘em down and then start putting the pushers of the shit that doesn’t work out of business. If a particular treatment shows some applicability in some area (e.g. ginger to treat nausea, which has been pretty well established) then that’s great! Use it for that purpose and stop selling it as a cure-all.
Irony Defined: Skin sanitizer recalled due to bacterial contamination.
Jun 10th
If you’ve got any skin sanitizer products produced by Clarcon Biological Chemistry Laboratory Inc. of Roy, Utah then you may want to throw them out. Seems the FDA has issued a warning that the products are contaminated with bacteria:
Analyses of several samples of over-the-counter topical antimicrobial skin sanitizer and skin protectant products revealed high levels of various bacteria, including some associated with unsanitary conditions, according to the agency. Some of these bacteria can cause opportunistic infections of the skin and underlying tissues and could result in medical or surgical attention as well as permanent damage.
Examples of products that should be discarded include Citrushield Lotion, Dermasentials DermaBarrier, Dermassentials by Clarcon, Antimicrobial Hand Sanitizer, Iron Fist Barrier Hand Treatment, Skin Shield Restaurant, Skin Shield Industrial, Skin Shield Beauty Salon Lotion, Total Skin Care Beauty and Total Skin Care Work.
The FDA said its findings, following a recent inspection of the Clarcon facility, are particularly concerning because the products are promoted as antimicrobial agents that claim to treat open wounds and damaged skin and protect against various infectious diseases. The inspection uncovered serious deviations from FDA’s Good Manufacturing Practice requirements, the agency said.
Looking at the Clarcon Labs website it doesn’t take long to see these people are selling bullshit products. Take, for example, this description of their Citrushield Lotion:
The CitruShield solution has been developed by professional dermatologists with the purpose of protecting your skin while healing and moisturizing at the same time. The solution protects the skin by first acting as a Anti-Microbial killing 99.9999 percent of not only germs but, bacteria like MRSA, C-Dif, staphs, gram positive and negative bacteria, germs, salmonella, ecoli, parasites, fungus, molds, and viruses continuously with only one application meaning you don’t need to keep re-applying until your skin exfoliates or until you use harsh soaps.
OK right off the bat we’ve got ridiculous claims and buzzword bingo going on. The 99.9999% claim is pure hype and is clearly false considering the FDA’s findings. I love the bit about how it kills “not only germs but, bacteria…”. Bacteria are microorganisms a.k.a. germs, but that doesn’t stop them from mentioning “gram positive and negative bacteria” later, which is a distinction only meaningful to microbiologists. (If you’re curious, most of the bacteria that are pathogenic in humans are gram negative but there’s a handful that are gram positive.) Then they mention germs again in case you missed it the first time. Germs are, by their very nature, parasites so it seems a little redundant to use that term. The claim that you don’t need to reapply it until your skin exfoliates is odd as you’re constantly exfoliating so how would you know you’ve exfoliated too much and need to reapply?
Additionally CitruShield repells caustic substancers like dirt, grease, oil, glue, paint, acids*, fibers, resins, inks, chemicals, and all similar products out of the skin’s pores; making it possible to remove these substances off of your skin with just a couple drops of water and rubbing your hands together creating friction then rinsing. Finally, as a moisturizer it repairs the acid mantel of your skin and relieves the problems of eczema, psoriasis, and dermatitis. It sounds impossible but it’s real, just try it and you’ll see how easy it is to keep your hands healthy and clean by using this gentle product.
Since when is dirt caustic? Or grease, oil, fibers, inks, or paint? Some acids and resins, sure, but “chemicals” is a very broad term. In the next sentence it sounds like they suggest washing your hands to get rid of these substances which makes one wonder why you’d need their product. If CitruShield “repells” [sic] acid out of the skin’s pores then how does it repair the skin’s acid mantle? Not to mention the fact that the only references I can find to the skin’s acid mantle are from questionable dermatology products. It also doesn’t help that they misspell the word as “mantle” which is something you have over your fireplace.
As for the claims that it “relieves the problems of eczema, psoriasis, and dermatitis.” Well, dermatitis is a very broad term that covers all manner of skin inflammations including eczema, which is ALSO a very broad term, so having both in the same sentence is redundancy for sake of sounding impressive. Moisturizing your skin is a common treatment for a number of different forms of dermatitis, including psoriasis, so if the product actually moisturizes then it may help, but then so would any brand of hand moisturizer. Though the implication in the breathless ad-copy suggests it’s more akin to a cure than just a relief from symptoms.
That was just the first paragraph on that page and the more you read the more the aroma of bullshit will start to invade your nostrils. They go on to suggest that you should use this product in place of standard soap and water in part because “its base is biological and can be killed by using other chemicals” and it’s “better than a regular antibacterial soap, because if your skin is damaged from using other hand cleansers, this product will promote healing of cracks and cuts on your hands.” They don’t bother to mention how it accomplishes all this, you just have to take their word for it. Oh, and the word of the people giving testimonials. You gotta have testimonials for a product like this and, of course, they’re all amazed at how good it is.
And that little asterisk they put next to the word acid in the first paragraph? It points to the following disclaimer:
*There are many types of Acids that are designed to perform certain functions. Some more caustic and dangerous than others, some that produce extreme gases that can cause illness and even death. Additionally, each person has different chemistry and can react differently to acids and its gases and should be very careful how they deal with acid. In as much that Clarcon is not sure how a certain type of acid may be used and in what format nor are they aware of the physical chemistry of each individual it is recommended that you research the type of acid you will be using and how and understand your chemistry and still take precautions against the use of acid. The miss application of CitruShield or the “wearing off’” of CitruShield could leave you exposed to the effects of acid; therefore Clarcon Biological Chemistry Labs assume no responsibility for injuries that may occur when someone may be exposed to acid as there are too many variables that can take place when dealing with acids and/or improper application of CitruShield.
SEB Translation: If you spread CitruShield all over your naked body and then go swimming in a vat of hydrochloric acid, don’t come crying to us. The fact that you’re stupid enough to buy our products tells us you might be stupid enough to try such a stunt and then sue us.
Swine flu deaths: 150. Regular flu deaths: 250,000+.
Apr 29th
So everyone seems to be in a mild panic over the swine flu outbreak that has killed 150 people so far in Mexico. This is amusing when you consider the death toll from ordinary flu:
Since January, more than 13,000 people have died of complications from seasonal flu, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s weekly report on the causes of death in the nation.
No fewer than 800 flu-related deaths were reported in any week between January 1 and April 18, the most recent week for which figures were available.
The report looks at deaths in the 122 largest cities in the United States.
Worldwide, the annual death toll from the flu is estimated to be between 250,000 and 500,000.
The only real concern to be had about the swine flu is that it’s a new strain so there’s no vaccine for it yet, but there probably will be before too long and in the meantime there are effective anti-viral medications that’ll work on it. The vast majority of people that catch swine flu will survive it, though there’s likely to be a few deaths given how many people ordinary flu kills on a regular basis. It’s something to be aware of, but nothing to panic about. Especially when you consider some other historical flu outbreaks to put things in perspective:
It’s estimated that about 28 per cent of Canadians and Americans contracted the Spanish flu. Worldwide, an estimated 2.5 per cent of the sick died of complications, which made the pandemic one of the most lethal flu outbreaks in recorded history. Certainly it was one that imprinted itself upon human consciousness for several generations.
But there’s another way to look at those statistics. You might observe, for example, that they mean that even during the worst ravages of the 1918 flu, 97.5 per cent of those infected survived and recovered. Or that 72 per cent of the population—even in the absence of the sophisticated public health planning and infrastructure that Canada and the U.S. have since built—was not infected during the pandemic.
So, even if we had a repeat of the 1918 flu, the chances were seven out of 10 that you wouldn’t catch it and if you did, the odds were better than nine out of 10 that you’d survive.
You want a pandemic to panic about? How about panicking a little over AIDS?
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) has led to the deaths of more than 25 million people since it was first recognized in 1981, making it one of the most destructive epidemics in recorded history. Despite recent improved access to antiretroviral treatment and care in many regions of the world, in 2007 the AIDS pandemic killed an estimated 2.1 million people, including 330,000 children. In 2007, an estimated 33.2 million people lived with the disease worldwide, with an estimated 2.5 million people newly infected in 2007. This has been attributed to lack of access to antiretroviral treatment in huge areas such as the continent of Africa, where less than 10 percent of infected are reported to have access to it. The pandemic is not homogeneous within regions, with some countries more afflicted than others. Even at the country level, there are wide variations in infection levels between different areas. The number of people living with HIV continues to rise in most parts of the world, despite the implementation of prevention strategies. Sub-Saharan Africa remains by far the worst-affected region, with an estimated 22.5 million people living with HIV at the end of 2007, 68% of the global total. South & South East Asia have an estimated 12% of the global total.
Now that’s something to get a little panicky about.
FTC considers rule changes on advert testimonials.
Mar 23rd
We’ve all seen ads for various weight loss pills and diet plans that start off by showing someone who looks like Jabba the Hutt’s sibling as the before picture followed by a live model who has the sort of figure that’s only gained after months on a proper diet with regular workouts under the supervision of a highly paid physical trainer. Often they’ll make outlandish claims such as: “Using MegaSuperDietPillExtreme I lost a whopping 4,000 pounds in JUST THREE WEEKS eating EVERYTHING IN SIGHT!” The implication being that all you need to do to look as fabulous as the model is swallow some overpriced pills. All the while at the bottom of the TV screen/magazine ad is a little bit of tiny white text on a white background that reads “Results not typical.”
Wouldn’t it be nice if the companies had to show you what a “typical result” actually is in addition to, if not in place of, the wildly successful result that isn’t typical? I think it would be and apparently the FTC is considering such a rule change:
Updated guidelines on ad endorsements and testimonials under final review by the Federal Trade Commission—and widely expected to be adopted—would end marketers’ ability to talk up the extreme benefits of products while carrying disclaimers like “results not typical” or “individual results may vary.”
Instead, companies would be allowed to tout extreme results only if they also spelled out typical outcomes.
“For a good part of the last decade, we have noticed a problem, particularly with consumer testimonials,” said Richard Cleland, assistant director of the FTC’s division of advertising practices. “The use of consumer testimonials had become almost a safe harbor for companies as long as they threw in some sort of disclaimer about results not being typical.”
This is true. That little bit of text is their YOU CAN’T SUE US IF YOU TRY THIS PRODUCT AND ARE STILL A GROSSLY HUGE LARD ASS pass. After all they never claimed YOU’D do as well on their diet pill, they only heavily suggested that you might do as well.
Needless to say this rule change is causing some amount of… concern… among the makers of useless products that make outrageous claims:
“There would never be another Jared,” said Julie Coons, president and chief executive of the marketing trade group Electronic Retailing Association, referring to Jared Fogle, who became Subway’s spokesman after losing 245 pounds eating the chain’s sandwiches and exercising. “We’re all going to have to regroup” if the proposals stand.
[...] The revisions have drawn sharp criticism from product manufacturers, advertising agencies and trade groups who say it is the “aspirational” theme of their ads that motivates consumers to purchase their goods. Show less than the ultimate achievement, they say, and consumers are less likely to buy.
SEB Translation: “We’re playing to people’s fantasies of a quick fix in a magic pill/diet plan/book. If we show them the typical reality then they won’t buy our craptastic products!”
Boo fucking hoo. My blood pressure goes through the roof when some of these ads come on that are so over the top in the claims being made. Not all of them are as bad as the fictional example I made up earlier, but more than enough are and some are even more ridiculous. But according to the marketeers it’s just too hard to come up with what a typical result would be:
What’s more, they say, it’s impossible to determine typical results for many personal-care products because of unique physiological characteristics among humans and the varying levels of effort put into any endeavor.
“A lightbulb, I can give you a typical result,” said Jonathan Gelfand, general counsel for Product Partners LLC, which sells fitness programs, gear and nutritional supplements under the “Beach Body” brand.
Bullshit. You get a bunch of people with similar conditions together and you give them your product and have them use it for awhile. Then you take the results and see where the majority of people ended up and that’s your typical result.
“Showing what people start and end with and saying very prominently, ‘Results may vary,’ that is as true as you can make it,” Gelfand said. “If we can’t show a picture and give results, what are we going to do?”
Part of the problem is that “results may vary” is almost never said/displayed/presented in any prominent fashion. It’s usually a hard to read bit of fine print that shows up for all of 10 seconds in a TV commercial. That’s just plain dishonest.
He added, “Someone who can’t fit in an airline seat is not going to pick up the phone for a 10-pound weight change.”
No shit, Sherlock. Of course if your product typically only produces a difference of 10-pounds in weight change (and I’ll note you didn’t mention if that was loss or gain) then it’s probably not of any real use to too many people in the first fucking place, but you still want to have that chance to try and convince them it might be. Greedy fucking bastards.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m overweight and lazy myself and would love for there to be a miracle pill that would make me as fit and ripped as a 27 year-old exercise enthusiast, but selling me something I’d love to have when you can’t really provide it is quite simply fraud. I don’t care how many times you tell me the results aren’t typical when everything else in your ad screams that they are. It’d be nice to get a little truth in the advertising for a change.
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